Neighbors See Someone Vandalize Their Cars On CCTV And Spring A Trap To Catch Him

Nowadays, chances are you don’t know your neighbors very well, particularly if you live in a big city. It’s sad, but it’s true. We just don’t connect with the people who live near us the way that we used to in bygone days.

This is a real shame—and it’s not just because getting to know your neighbors can be a great way to make friends! No, sometimes having your neighbors on standby if you need them can mean the difference between life and death.

When one group of Los Angeles neighbors discovered that someone had it out for them, they went to police. Unfortunately, they received little help. So, they banded together and took matters into their own hands…

When a group of neighbors in the West Hollywood area of Los Angeles, California, found themselves on the receiving end of several vandalism incidents, they didn’t know what to do. They tried calling the police, but little came of that.

So the neighbors decided to band together. If the police were not able to stop the vandal in his tracks, then they would do it together as a community. The first thing they decided to do was set up their own system of CCTV cameras so they could monitor the area. They didn’t want a repeat of what had happened earlier that year…

You see, just a few months prior, on another seemingly perfect day in the apartment complex where all these neighbors lived, nothing seemed out of the ordinary. That is, until one resident walked down the parking lot and made a shocking discovery…

Walking to his car in the parking lot, this resident saw something that stopped him in his tracks: all four of his car tires had been slashed! It felt like such a violation that everyone in the building was upset. But things were only just starting to get strange…

Just two days after the first car had been vandalized, another car was attacked in the parking lot. This time, only one of the tires was slashed, but one was more than enough to make people feel even more nervous about what was happening.

The next day brought more vandalism. This time, a car that had already been targeted was vandalized again. This time, the perpetrator used orange spray paint to completely deface the car. It was a shocking sight to behold.

A few days later, another car in the parking lot was tagged with the same bright orange-colored spray paint. For the residents of the building, it was more than an enough. This had been going on for a week and nothing seemed to be changing.

This is where their CCTVs came into play. The residents pooled their money and bought cameras to monitor the area. Before long, they noticed a suspicious figure who didn’t live in the building appearing on the tape two nights in a row. They knew there was only one thing they could do with this discovery…

They brought their footage straight to the police. Unfortunately, the cops weren’t able to do much with the information. Even the owners of the apartment complex building couldn’t do anything to stop this madness.

The residents of the building weren’t going to take this lying down. Instead, one woman who lived in the building vowed to stay up all night at the window and watch the parking lot where the cars of the residents were kept.

That very night, the woman noticed the same figure from the tapes making his way carefully into the parking lot. The woman immediately texted some other residents in the building, instructing them to call 911.

The police might have been on their way, but that didn’t stop one resident of the building from running down to the parking lot to try and apprehend the man he suspected of vandalizing all of their cars.

Everything that happened next was caught on tape by the CCTV cameras. One man who lived in the building rushed down to the lot to try to stop the intruder. He calmly asked him what was going on, but the intruder knew he was caught red-handed and tried to make a run for it.

The resident wasn’t going to let him get away this time, however. The two men began to scuffle. Other residents of the building made their way down to the parking lot to help their fellow neighbor. Before long, they made a citizen’s arrest of the suspected vandal.

The residents did their best to keep the intruder secured on the ground until the police arrived. While they waited, they discovered something in one of the intruder’s pockets that concerned everyone who was present.

It was a knife! Sure, he might have been planning to use the knife on the tires, but when the resident who spotted it thought about what else he could have done with it, her blood ran cold.

Once they found the knife on the man, they decided to restrain him using duct tape just to be on the safe side. Luckily, this was enough to keep the vandal secured until the police arrived and were able to arrest the man in question.

The man the police arrested that night is still being held in custody. When a local news team asked the residents of the apartment building what they would do if something like this happened again, they all agreed they wouldn’t hesitate to take action.

The local news couldn’t get enough of the story. They praised the residents of the building for taking such dramatic action. They also mentioned just how smart it was of them to install those cameras to catch the vandal in the act.

For the residents of this particular apartment building, it was just a relief to know that their ordeal was over. Though the experience was traumatic—engaging in a physical altercation with a stranger, let alone one who was armed with a weapon, was risky—it was also a nice reminder that these folks could always count on their neighbors.

What an amazing story! It’s sensational that these people were able to band together to stop this criminal from continuing to destroy their property.